South Africa Equity Markets | 22 Oct 2015: Equity Markets Maintains Positive Sentiment lead by Gold sector ….

Johannesburg, South Africa Capital Markets in Africa —Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) All Share (the broadest measure of the equity market performance) rose by 0.56 percent or 296.00 points to settle at 53,293.97 points and the benchmark JSE Top 40 index ended 220.13 points or 0.46 percent higher to end at 47,814.72 points.

From the sector indices, financial sector index added 0.43 percent or 193.60 points at 44,835.44 points. Industrial sector index and industrial 25 index gained 0.47 percent to end at 79,366.47 points and surged by 0.35 percent to trade at 71,428.40 points respectively. Also, the resource index soared by 1.32 percent or 454.94 points to settled at 34,856.04 points and the Gold mining sector index rose by 1.72 percent with a closing level of 1,055.47 points.

Looking at the market strength/breath (measured as ratio of gainers to losers), the market recorded 137 price gainers and 99 price losers, hence market strength/breathe closed in positive sentiment.  On the top ten biggest gainers list today was Clicks Group, whose shares rose 7.99 percent to sell at ZAR 103.00 after investors bought and sold 1,836,900 shares in 4,617 deals. Glencore Xstrata gained 6.47 percent after 1,307 deals traded 3,494,359 shares, pushing the share price up to ZAR 24.34. Kumba Iron Ore fell to ZAR 75.28 after investors exchanged 1,725,091 shares in 5,682 deals, resulting in a loss of 5.96 percent in the share price. After 1,164 deals totalling 2,647,748 shares, Aveng slid 5.74 percent to ZAR 3.45 a share.

On the forex markets front, the South rand was stronger against US dollar at ZAR 13.4077 after adding 0.69 percent and against British pound to trade at ZAR 20.6022 after gaining 0.90 percent. The rand also jumped by 2.65 percent against the Euro to close at ZAR 14.9089.